


One Day

by Dracoduceus



Series: Words With Benefits [6]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alien Hanzo, Alien Symmetra, Alien Zarya, Alternate Universe, Arranged Marriage, Background Relationships, Background Symmarah, Human Jesse McCree, Idiots in Love, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-05
Updated: 2020-04-05
Packaged: 2021-03-01 04:26:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23489059
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dracoduceus/pseuds/Dracoduceus
Summary: To say that Hanzo "isn't from around here" would be an understatement. In actuality he is from another planet, masquerading as a human after the ship carrying his betrothed, her guard, and himself crashed on Earth. Thinking themselves forgotten, he, Saty, and Zarya moved on with their lives...But then they received a notice from the fleet, that their rescue will come soon. Suddenly, Hanzo has a tough decision: his wonderful human husband, or returning to his duty among his people.
Relationships: Jesse McCree/Hanzo Shimada
Series: Words With Benefits [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1498223
Comments: 32
Kudos: 147





	One Day

**Author's Note:**

> Based on a polled prompt: Hanzo is an alien pretending to be human and trying to get off the planet. McCree has no idea.

Hanzo’s lip curled.

Human music was so…loud. Beside him, he could see Saty also wincing, gritting her teeth with each thunder of some strange instrument; it felt as if the vibrations would break the glass in his hand.

“Not the clubbing type of guy, huh?”

Hanzo turned toward the voice, taking a moment to translate the phrase, and frowned at the human. Most others had been scared away by his expression, by the tilt of his chin. Before coming to Earth, Hanzo had studied the behavior of its animals and used this to assert dominance in each conversation with the satisfying effect that most didn’t bother him.

Not this human, though.

Hanzo regarded him for a long moment: tall with wavy brown hair and dark eyes. He was baring his teeth and Hanzo took a moment to realize that it was in a friendly gesture and not aggression. The man also held a cup of weak human liquor in one hand; the other was an ugly metal prosthesis.

“I am not fond of it,” Hanzo admitted and then had to repeat himself louder to be heard over the ridiculous volume of “music” currently playing.

The man’s friendly expression didn’t change. He held out a hand in a human greeting. “My name’s Jesse. Jesse McCree.”

Hanzo clasped his hand reluctantly, not caring if it showed in his face. “Hanzo,” he said and briefly forgot what his cover's name was supposed to be. Jesse McCree’s eyes were strangely mesmerizing, his hand warm in Hanzo’s. “Shimada,” he added belatedly.

“A beautiful name for a beautiful man,” Jesse McCree said and Hanzo realized that this man was likely looking for a mate. He wasn’t sure that they even had compatible reproductive equipment—not that reproduction was the _only_ reason for mating.

Hanzo felt his face flush in a human expression of mild agitation and confusion. “I’m not sure that I can provide you with what you want,” he said stiffly.

If he was put off by Hanzo’s response, Jesse McCree didn’t show it. He continued to smile. “Even if this is all I get from you, I still get to say that I met an angel.”

Hanzo wondered if he was inebriated; if so, how inebriated. Perhaps he had drunk too much of this weak human alcohol—human systems were less efficient at processing it, after all.

“Still, all I want,” the man continued. “Is perhaps a quiet walk with you. I find myself uncomfortable with this music and…I’d love to go for a walk with you at the park.”

That’s right, Hanzo remembered. There’s a park a block down the street.

Despite himself, he was intrigued by this human—and if he meant ill, it wasn’t as if Hanzo couldn’t defend himself. His people were known for their great strength, after all. Making eye contact with Jesse McCree, he drained the weak liquor in his glass, put it on the bar with a tip of human currency for the bartender, and smiled. “Let me tell my friend,” he told the human.

Jesse McCree’s grin widened. “I’ll meet you by the front door, beautiful,” he said in Hanzo’s ear, leaning close for a delirious moment. And then he was gone and Hanzo felt strangely…bereft without him nearby.

Fascinating, Hanzo thought to himself and went to look for Saty.

* * *

“Penny for your thoughts?”

Hanzo glanced over at his human mate, unable to help the way that his lips curved upward into a fond human smile. He leaned in close for a human kiss that he had long since gotten addicted to.

“I was just thinking,” Hanzo said evasively.

Jesse’s smile took on a wicked edge. “No wonder I smelled something burning,” he teased. Despite himself, Hanzo laughed. “What about?”

“How we met,” Hanzo admitted readily enough.

“How I swept you off your feet?” Jesse asked, leaning in for another warm kiss.

Hanzo laughed. “You swept me off my feet,” he agreed. “And right into the lake in the middle of the park!”

Both of them laughed and Jesse climbed halfway on Hanzo, resting his head on Hanzo’s shoulder. They spent a few minutes like that, basking in each other’s warmth as the light of Earth’s lonely star crept into their shared room.

“Almost time to get up,” Jesse said reluctantly, wiggling his head into Hanzo’s shoulder as if trying to burrow deeper. Hanzo squeezed him closer before releasing him; with a heavy sigh, Jesse rolled away and let Hanzo get to his feet to get ready for the day.

Hanzo leaned close to kiss away the frown. It didn’t quite work.

“One of these days,” Jesse told him sternly, his mood belied by the soft smile on his face. “One of these days you’re going to sleep in with me. What’s the point of being the big boss if you don’t abuse your power?”

Despite himself, Hanzo laughed and got dressed. When he came back out, Jesse was half-dressed himself and struggling with the buttons of his shirt. Hanzo kissed him and briskly buttoned them for him.

“One day,” Hanzo told him and Jesse rolled his eyes.

“‘One day’,” he teased. “You always say that. ‘One day’ you’ll have a lazy morning with me—and one day the world will end!” Despite his words, he didn’t seem truly upset but Hanzo still pressed kisses to his eyelids and nose and then his mouth again.

He truly had gotten addicted to such things. Kisses and hugs and gentle touches by a gentle human mate.

They made a human breakfast together in the next room. Hanzo had never been fond of eggs and most other animal proteins were indigestible by his people, so he ate some of Jesse’s spiced potatoes with rice seasoned with citrus and a tangy herb that Hanzo could never correctly guess. He called it the “soap herb” and Jesse called him a heathen and blasphemer.

Jesse wore an apron that said “Kiss the Cook” so Hanzo did as he got ready to leave and was nearly delayed further when Jesse pulled him closer for a longer kiss. “Jesse,” he complained, not really complaining at all when he felt Jesse’s hands press wonderfully against the muscles of his back.

“I have your lunch ready,” Jesse said after another round of biting kisses.

“Tease,” Hanzo laughed, aware that his lips were red and swollen and not caring. He took the insulated bag from Jesse, kissed his nose, and left before he could be reeled back in for more.

His primitive Earth car rumbled noisily as he drove it into the office that he and Saty had bought for their business. After so long, he’d gotten used to what he thought was an inordinate amount of noise; now he found it soothing, like the purring of some enormous metal creature.

“ _Hello_ ,” Zarya said in their native tongue as she saw him enter. She fell in step beside and slightly behind him. “ _Have you talked to Saty yet?_ ”

The security guards at their personal elevator looked at them strangely but at a sideways look at them they turned back around. He waited until the doors closed between them before answering, “ _No? Was I supposed to?_ ”

Zarya shrugged. “ _She got a little cryptic with me this morning_ ,” she said. “ _But she said that she was waiting to hear from you first_.”

“ _Cryptic about what?_ ” Hanzo asked and Zarya shrugged.

“ _I suspect we’re about to find out_ ,” she pointed out when the elevator reached their floor. They both walked out and, as expected, found Saty waiting for them.

She had set up a table with tea—an indulgence she had been introduced to on Earth—and Hanzo gratefully took one of the prepared seats. Jesse liked his tea cold and painfully sweet—despite his complaints on the amount of sugar in each drink, Hanzo enjoyed the fruit-infused ones that Jesse made in the spring and summer.

Saty’s tea was very different. She liked it hot and filled with Earth spices that he hadn’t tried until being marooned on the planet. Jesse’s teas were best enjoyed in the hot sun on their porch; Saty’s teas were best enjoyed hot, in the mornings or in the cold months.

“ _I heard from the fleet this morning,_ ” Saty said without preamble. She seemed to be vibrating with excitement, fiddling with her napkin, with the porcelain saucer that Jesse had gotten for her one winter holiday, with the gentle curve of her teacup. “ _They will be in the area shortly_.”

Hanzo felt his stomachs sink into his feet; never before had he understood such a phrase until that very moment.

“ _How shortly?_ ” Zarya asked into the silence that yawned between them like a void.

Saty shook her head. “ _They were unclear_ ,” she said. “ _I suspect out of concern that the transmission may be intercepted. But I suspect that we had better make preparations to move quickly to meet up with the shuttle to take…us back._ ”

For a long moment they were all quiet.

The steam curled up from their mugs, none of them touching their tea.

“ _Five years,_ ” Zarya said at last. “ _Five years and_ now _they remember us?_ ”

Hanzo thought of Jesse. Of watching the Earth’s sun make a golden track across their bed. Thought of sitting on the porch with him and listening to the hiss of the cicadas in the summer and watching the golden glow of the lightning bugs in the fall.

Five years of that kind of joy had etched itself into his hearts and now he had to give it up. He bowed his head and tried not to think of whiskery kisses and sweet tea that tasted like peaches and blackberries, of the warmth of his human mate as they curled up beneath the duvet together.

Of promises of ‘one day’ that may never happen.

He bowed his head. “ _Very well_ ,” he said, though it took everything in him to force the words out. “ _I will…be ready._ ”

“ _What about Jesse?_ ” Zarya demanded, her words like a slap. “ _Are you just going to leave him?_ ”

Hanzo forced himself to look at her, kept his expression neutral. “ _I will do my duty_ ,” he said. “ _Please excuse me_.” He stood and walked into his office, his appetite for Saty’s warm spiced tea gone.

In his own office, he closed the door and engaged the privacy field that would keep Saty and Zarya from hearing him or seeing that he slumped to the ground behind the door. He drew his legs up to his chest the way he had seen Earth pups do.

Never before had he been so tempted to ignore his duty to his people. As a pup, hadn’t he so abhorred deserters? What sweet irony that he would now consider it; consider turning his back on his people in favor of a human mate.

He’d already done that, in some ways, just by taking Jesse as his. Before he, Saty, and Zarya had been marooned on this primitive planet, he had been engaged to be married to strengthen ties to his clan. For the greater good, he had been prepared to do so—and before they were the only three of their kind on Earth, he had _liked_ Saty well enough. Hadn’t that been why he had agreed on this trip?

Soon.

How soon?

Hanzo swallowed and looked down at the little insulated lunchbox at his feet. He opened the flap and pulled out the note that Jesse always included when he packed Hanzo’s lunch.

_I love you,_ Jesse’s neat printing said. _XOXO_ —which Jesse had long ago told him represented hugs and kisses.

Hanzo traced the impression that Jesse’s pen had made in the paper. He knew that Saty knew of Jesse, knew that he thought of the human as his mate—was mated by human law. She had given her “blessing”, as the humans called it. Did she believe—as would be logical—that they would resume their engagement when they returned to their people?

Could _he_?

He knew that Saty had her own human lover. Would she give her up too? It was logical but…

Swallowing hard, Hanzo got to his feet and closed the insulated lunch box. He tucked the note into his pocket and got to work.

* * *

“Penny for your thoughts?” Jesse asked that night at dinner.

Hanzo paused, his fork halfway to his mouth. “Pardon?”

His human mate was looking at him with concern on his face. “Are you okay, Han?”

Han. A human nickname that Jesse sometimes called him but only rarely. “I am…fine,” he said at last.

“No you’re not,” Jesse told him gently, reaching across the table to touch Hanzo’s hand. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, but I’m here for you. If you need me.”

Hanzo swallowed the lump in his throat—a human saying. It was a metaphoric thing but Hanzo could almost clearly feel it choking him. “I know,” he said in a cracked voice. “Thank you.” Jesse squeezed his fingers and he managed a weak smile, tangling his fingers with his human mate’s. He cleared his throat. “I…I love you.”

“You say that like you’re not sure,” Jesse pointed out, his smile wavering.

“Of course I’m sure,” Hanzo told him sharply. He winced when Jesse did. “Of _course_ I’m sure,” he said, softer, gentler. “That is never something that I’ve doubted. I just…I was thinking about it today.”

_I was thinking about how much it will hurt me to leave you behind,_ Hanzo thought but didn’t say. _It will be like a wound, like I am missing a part of me. I’m trying not to think about it but that’s all I can think of._

Jesse squeezed his fingers. “I love you too,” he said. “More than anything.”

It felt like hands closed around Hanzo’s throat. He squeezed Jesse’s fingers and they returned to their meal.

* * *

_Soon._

The words were written innocuously on his message reader in Saty’s neat hand. More words appeared, each stroke of each complex character precise: _Very soon. Be ready._

He swallowed and pulled out his stylus with a shaking hand. _How soon?_ He asked. _Tonight?_

_No,_ Saty replied immediately. _But maybe tomorrow night._

Hanzo sat down hard on the bed. He could hear the shower still running and he closed his eyes. If he concentrated, he could hear Jesse humming to himself as he washed himself.

What do you do when you’re told that the life you’ve been building for the past five years is about to fall apart? What do you tell your spouse, your beautiful, wonderful human mate that you truly do love more than the stars and the moon and your own family, that you’re about to leave them forever?

He looked at the message reader and found that Zarya had responded: _I will not leave the life I have here._

_Are you sure?_ Saty asked. _I doubt that they will come back again if you change your mind._

Hanzo closed the message reader. He wished that he had Zarya’s freedom. She was “only” a guard—Saty’s personal guard and their chaperone to ensure that they didn’t do anything stupid while they traveled.

She didn’t bear the weight of responsibility of her clan that he did. She wasn’t expected to marry in order to solidify connections between two clans.

The shower was still going. Hanzo opened the message reader again.

_They forgot about us for five Earth years,_ Zarya pointed out. _And they don’t care about me. I will not leave the love I found here._

What did it say about Hanzo that he prepared himself to do the very thing that Zarya refused to do?

Saty replied, _Then I wish you love and happiness._

There was nothing else. Hanzo closed the message reader and hid it away so that Jesse wouldn’t find it. He heard the shower turn off, the faucet creaking, and tried hard to not let Jesse know that this may be their last night together.

Later, as they lay in bed together, Hanzo’s thoughts spilled over. These last few years had been the happiest of his entire life and he wasn’t even sure that he could say goodbye.

“What would you do?” he asked into the darkness of their bedroom. The Earth’s lonely moon had not yet risen but still painted their room in shades of silver; gold came from the streetlights outside.

Jesse mumbled sleepily against his back.

“If this was our last night together?” Hanzo asked. “What would you do?”

Behind him, Jesse jolted and rolled Hanzo over. His wonderful human mate’s face was a mask of tragedy, of open terror. “Han?”

Hanzo couldn’t even find it in him to comfort him. He touched Jesse’s face and committed it to memory. Eyes and lips that should be smiling. A fan of long lashes, a scruffy beard that was softer than it looked. Sun freckles that appeared in the summer and disappeared in the winter.

“What if I had to leave?” Hanzo asked. “And I could never come back? What if this is the last time that I could ever see you again in the moonlight?”

McCree swallowed visibly. “Han, Hanzo, you’re scaring me, baby.” His voice cracked.

“I’m scared too,” Hanzo admitted.

Jesse visibly struggled with that. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know,” Hanzo whispered. “I don’t know if I can tell you.”

His beautiful human mate opened and closed his mouth a few times, seemingly trying to decide what to say. “Whatever is happening,” he said at last. “You can tell me, Hanzo. ‘Until death do us part’, remember? ‘Forever and a day’.”

_Forever ends tomorrow,_ Hanzo thought but didn’t say. _And I would give a thousand titles to bring you with me; to keep myself here._

Hanzo leaned in and kissed Jesse. “I’m sorry to have scared you,” Hanzo said. “I just…got into my own head.”

“What’s wrong, Han?” Jesse asked, so worried, so earnestly that Hanzo nearly told him.

Tugging him close, Hanzo kissed him softly. “I’m sorry to have scared you,” Hanzo whispered against his lips.

“Why does this sound like goodbye?” Jesse asked, his dark eyes watery. “Han—“

“It’s not,” Hanzo promised. _This isn’t goodbye,_ he thought but didn’t say. T _omorrow would be._ He swallowed thickly. “I’m sorry to have scared you.”

For a long moment, Jesse looked down at him. He sighed. “You really scared me,” he said. “I just…give me a sec, okay?”

Even though it hurt, Hanzo nodded. He wanted nothing more than to spend every last second holding his wonderful human mate. But Jesse needed space now, more than he needed Hanzo scaring him.

“I’ll…be back.”

Hanzo watched him leave, disappear into the darkness of the hallway.

He fell asleep waiting for Jesse to come back to bed.

* * *

The next morning, he woke up alone.

The sheets were cold on Jesse’s side of the bed and Hanzo let his head hang. He climbed out of bed and padded down the stairs. In the living room, there was a pile of blankets and pillows on the couch, all neatly folded—he found where Jesse had stayed the night before and his hearts leaped into his throat.

He walked into the kitchen and found it likewise empty.

There was an insulated cooler on the kitchen counter, full with a lunch that Hanzo wouldn’t take to work. There was a note on the table next to it.

_Went to work early,_ Jesse had written. _I’ll be back early. Then you and I can have a nice dinner. I’ll make your favorites._

_XOXO Jesse_

Hanzo’s hearts choked him. “We would finally have our ‘one day’,” Hanzo whispered to the empty kitchen. “The ‘one day’ that I always promised but never gave you.”

He dug around in the kitchen and found the drawer where Jesse kept the pens and notepads. There was one that had had a cartoonish drawing of Earth’s solar system. It seemed fitting.

_I wish that I could give you the world,_ Hanzo wrote. _I wish that I could give you the stars. But I couldn’t even give you myself; how could I ever love you like you deserve?_

He paused, swallowed. His hand was shaking. How do you say goodbye this way? So impersonally?

Logically he knew that he could get his human cellular telephone. He could text Jesse to call him as soon as he could.

He probably should.

Putting the pen and notepad down, he ran upstairs and checked his message reader. Saty had sent a time—an hour away—and a set of coordinates.

Hanzo laughed bitterly. Even if Jesse had been here, he couldn’t even give him that ‘one day’ of staying in bed together. He got dressed with shaking hands, collected the keys to his primitive Earth vehicle. He paused in the kitchen, looked at the note. Jesse deserved better than this.

He taped the first note to the counter and started the next. _There are so many things that I wish that I had said, that I wish that I had told you. Now that I find myself out of time, I don’t know what to do, what to say._

Another note. _Nothing I say can make you believe that I love you more than anything._ A tear dropped to the counter. _And I wish that I could stay._

Swallowing hard, he hesitated over the next note. What else do you say? Should he say? Could he say?

_I love you,_ he wrote, but it sounded…it wasn’t enough.

But nothing he wrote or said or did would ever _be_ enough.

He looked down at the ring on his finger, debated taking it off. But…he couldn’t bear to do it. It would be the last thing he had of Jesse, after all.

With one last look at the house that had been their home for the past three years, at a space that should have been filled with the laughter and humming and happy smiles of his wonderful human mate, his Jesse, he walked out the door.

* * *

Saty was already there and Hanzo climbed out of his car, climbing the hill where the ship was to pick them up.

He was surprised to find her human girlfriend, Fareeha, with her. Zarya was there as well, her arms crossed over her chest.

“I can’t do it, Hanzo,” Saty told him, her voice surprisingly level despite the fierce grip she had on Fareeha’s hand. He saw the human wince. “I thought that I could, but…”

Hanzo swallowed thickly. “I understand,” he said.

Saty bowed her head. “I told her,” she whispered. “I told Ree last night—I couldn’t just…leave. She knows.”

“Where’s Jesse?” Fareeha asked and Hanzo looked away. “Oh.”

“He went to work this morning,” Hanzo said. “I…tried to speak to him last night. It didn’t go well; he was gone when I woke up.”

Fareeha cursed but he didn’t think she was directing all of it toward him. She swallowed. “I’ll…take care of him.”

“Thank you.”

He could feel the ripple of energy—the ship was nearby. It flew soundlessly through the air, invisible except by the wind in its wake that made the trees around them sway and groan.

Glancing at Zarya and Saty, Hanzo shifted into his true form, feeling his clothes groan as the seams stretched to fit a form it wasn’t made for. Fortunately for his dignity, they remained intact.

Somehow his wedding ring remained around his finger, neither too loose nor too tight.

To his surprise, his brother appeared before them and wrapped his arms around Hanzo’s neck. “ _We were so worried!_ ” Genji cried, his tail wagging. “ _Saty! Zarya! You’re here too! You’re all alive!_ ”

“ _We are_ ,” Hanzo said solemnly.

Genji’s eyes dropped to the glint of gold around Hanzo’s finger. “ _Did you mate?_ ” Genji asked, looking between Hanzo and Saty, who was murmuring a quiet translation to Fareeha. His eyes dropped to where their hands were still tangled together. “ _Not with Saty?_ ”

“ _I…had a human mate,_ ” Hanzo said. “ _Four years_.”

Surprisingly, his brother seemed pleased. “ _I’m happy for you!_ ” he said. “ _Where is she?_ ”

Hanzo hesitated. “He _and…we are no longer mated._ ”

His brother’s grin faded, the excited wag of his tail slowing. “ _Oh_ ,” he said. “ _I’m so sorry, Hanzo. Does that mean…that you want to stay? Or are there too many bad memories?_ ”

“ _Why would I stay?_ ” Hanzo asked sharply. “ _And desert our people? Our clan?_ ”

Genji scoffed. “ _Oh_ please,” he said. “ _It would hardly be deserting our people for you to follow your heart_.”

“ _It doesn’t matter_ ,” Hanzo said, looking out over the trees in the direction of the house that he once shared with Jesse. “ _He won’t want me back. Not after this._ ”

For a long moment, Genji regarded him, a strange kind of seriousness falling over his face. “ _You really love your mate_ ,” Genji said. “ _And you love this world. I see no reason for you to leave and be miserable. You will have Saty and Zarya to keep you company should you get too lonely and…_ ” he turned to Fareeha, peered at her.

“ _This is Fareeha,_ ” Saty told Genji. “ _We are courting._ ”

Genji snorted. Fareeha stared boldly back at him and he laughed. “ _I see no reason to drag you back to where you cannot be as you are_ ,” he said and straightened to his full height. Only then did Hanzo notice the braids in his mane that marked him as the heir apparent.

He’d been missing for so long, Hanzo realized. It would make sense that the line of succession would skip him.

“ _I hereby pardon Saty of Vishkar, her guard Zaryanova, and Hanzo of Hanamura; I give them my blessing to leave their clans and their people to follow the ways of the hearts._ ” There was an almost-human smirk on Genji’s snout. “ _And I bless the unions here: Saty and her Fareeha, Hanzo and his mate, and Zaryanova and whomever she chooses. May you live long in joy_.” Then Genji bowed his head, signifying that his ruling had been made and that it was final.

Hanzo reluctantly bowed his head in return, as did Zarya and Saty; Fareeha followed a moment later, though she wasn’t strictly bound to the protocol of their kind.

“ _There_ ,” Genji said brightly. “ _It is done. Be happy, brother_.”

Be happy.

He thought of Jesse.

* * *

Genji could not stay long, but promised to visit “soon” and Hanzo was left, feeling as if he were a puppet whose strings had been cut.

“Isn’t that wonderful, Hanzo?” Saty asked as Zarya whispered to Fareeha what had just happened.

Hanzo shifted back into his human form, still reeling. “Is it?” he asked thickly.

“Of course it is,” Saty told him sharply. “Now go—if you leave now, you might be able to beat Jesse home. Go!”

Still feeling strangely empty, Hanzo stumbled to his car. Somehow he got it started, began driving home. Jesse’s car wasn’t in the driveway.

He paused in front of the door, hesitated despite himself. How do you go back?

Swallowing hard, he opened the door and walked into the kitchen. Bags of groceries leaned against the counter and something glittered on the counter next to the solar system notepad he had left out. It was a ring; written on the pad was _WHY?_

The other notes were gone.

Hanzo looked around. The knife with the antler bone handle was gone; so were some of the dishes in the drying rack.

Hearts in his throat, Hanzo climbed the steps and went to their room, to their bathroom. Where once there were two towels on the rack, only one hung; a cup with two toothbrushes now only held one. Every drawer seemed half empty without Jesse’s shirts, flannels, underwear, his mismatched socks. The closet seemed even larger without his thick jackets, his parkas, his boots and helmets and safety gear.

Very slowly Hanzo climbed back down the stairs.

Pictures were missing. The small trinkets that Jesse used to collect. Records—old vinyl discs—and DVDs. Posters. He suspected that Jesse’s favorite armchair was still there because it wouldn’t fit in his car.

He sat down heavily on the couch, holding the ring that Jesse had left behind—their wedding ring. Saty had made it for them, had engraved the messages on the inside of the bands.

Thinking of Saty had him pulling out his message reader. _He left,_ he reported to her and Zarya. Unsure of what else to say or write, he put the message reader on the table. He looked at the ring in his hand again.

Saty had engraved in their language, _Love as Unbroken as This Ring_ , a common mating blessing among their people; they had told Jesse that it was Japanese but hadn’t lied about its meaning or importance. On Hanzo’s ring, Jesse had asked Saty to engrave, _Blessed by Your Love._

“A blessing?” Hanzo asked now. “Or a curse?”

He looked around their house—perhaps only his now, if Jesse had truly left. How could he have left this behind? So willingly given this up?

Duty to his family; what about duty to his mate?

He took a shuddering breath and looked down at the ring in his hand again, ran a finger along the words in the gold. It had worn slightly, the edges of the characters beginning to fade.

Hanzo lost track of how long he sat there, staring blankly down at the ring in his hand. He looked up when he heard someone at the door.

He looked over, straightening when he recognized Jesse’s silhouette in the doorway. A moment later, Fareeha followed; she closed the door behind them. Jesse had a strange look on his face as he approached and sat down carefully on the coffee table in front of Hanzo.

“I think we need to have a talk,” Jesse said, his eyes on the ring in Hanzo’s hands.

Hanzo swallowed. “Yes,” he said as Fareeha settled herself in a nearby chair. “I think so too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Love it? Hate it? Let me know!
> 
> You can also find me on Twitter at [dracoduceus](https://twitter.com/dracoduceus). 
> 
> ~DC


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